Soil biodiversity is fundamental for ecosystems, ensuring many ecosystem functions, such as nutrient cycling, organic matter decomposition, soil formation, and organic carbon pool increase. Due to these roles, there is a need to study and completely understand how soil biodiversity is composed through different habitats. The aim of this study was to describe the edaphic soil community of the alpine environments belonging to the Gran Paradiso National Park, thus detecting if there are any correlation with environmental features. We studied soil fauna through environmental DNA metabarcoding. From eDNA metabarcoding, 18 families of arthropods were successfully detected, and their abundance expressed in terms of the relative frequency of sequences. Soil faunal communities of mixed coniferous forests were characterized by Isotomidae, Entomobriydae, Hypogastruridae, and Onychiuridae; while mixed deciduous forests were composed mostly by Isotomidae, Cicadidae, Culicidae, and Neelidae. Calcicolous and acidic grasslands also presented families that were not detected in forest habitats, in particular Scarabaeidae, Curculionidae, Brachyceridae, and had in general a more differentiated soil community. Results of the Canonical Component Analysis revealed that the main environmental features affecting soil community for forests were related to vegetation (mixed deciduous forests, tree basal area, tree biomass, Shannon index), soil (organic layers and organic carbon stock), and site (altitude); while for prairies, soil pH and slope were also significant in explaining soil community composition. This study provided a description of the soil fauna of alpine habitats and resulted in a description of community composition per habitat and the relation with the characteristic of vegetation, soil, and topographic features of the study area. Further studies are needed to clarify ecological roles and needs of these families and their role in ecosystem functioning.

中文翻译：

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通过eDNA元条形码评价高山栖息地土壤生物多样性及其与环境特征的关系。

土壤生物多样性是生态系统的基础，可确保许多生态系统功能，例如养分循环，有机物分解，土壤形成和有机碳库增加。由于这些作用，有必要研究并完全理解不同生境如何构成土壤生物多样性。这项研究的目的是描述属于Gran Paradiso国家公园的高山环境的浅层土壤群落，从而检测其是否与环境特征相关。我们通过环境DNA元条形码研究了土壤动物。从eDNA元条形码中，成功检测到18个节肢动物科，并以序列的相对频率表示它们的丰度。混合针叶林的土壤动物群落的特征是异mid科，昆虫纲，下腹龙科和甲龙科；而落叶混合森林则主要由异by科，mid科，葫芦科和ida科组成。钙质和酸性草原还表现出在森林栖息地中未发现的科，特别是金龟科，弯刀科，短尾科，并且总体上具有更分化的土壤群落。典型成分分析的结果表明，影响森林土壤群落的主要环境特征与植被（落叶混交林，树基面积，树木生物量，香农指数），土壤（有机层和有机碳储量）和地点（高度）; 而在大草原，土壤的pH值和坡度在解释土壤群落组成方面也很重要。这项研究描述了高山生境的土壤动物，并描述了每个生境的群落组成，以及与研究区域的植被，土壤和地形特征的关系。需要进一步研究以阐明这些家庭的生态作用和需求以及它们在生态系统功能中的作用。